British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Considered a 'Significant' Breach of Media Rules, Declares UK Media Regulator
The public service broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the voice of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas official, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
The regulator has ordered the corporation to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the BBC to air a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's statement stated: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the documentary's omission to reveal that the presenter's male guardian held a position in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.
"This implied that the viewers did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the presenter and the information he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its viewers, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the possibility to damage the very considerable degrees of trust that the public would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was withdrawn from the online platform in last February after the boy's personal associations came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it breached the broadcaster's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
